How soon after dosing lanthanum would tangs die?

[BryanM]

For the people who had tangs die from lanthanum chloride, how soon did you notice the negative effects of it? If the tang died, how soon after the dose did it?

Does it kill rapidly or are the effects observed after some time? If I were to dose lanthanum, how long thereafter would I know I’m in the clear?

Has lanthanum dosing ever killed some tangs, but not others, within a community?

I'm not exactly the target audience here because I've dosed LC and not lost anything, and have quite a few tangs.

But after reading a couple other threads where people lost all their tangs within 24hrs, but the other fish survived, I decided I should go the GFO route instead.

 

[Nano_Man]

I've used it before with great success. But like anything I started at a lower strength and I dripped it in . Then over time built up the dose never had any bad effects

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

In terms of tank to tank differences and the lack of understanding what is important, one thing that lanthanum is known to do is interfere with calcium channels through membranes, which are critical for many biological functions.

This interference may be impacted by both pH and possibly the external calcium level.

 

[TeeJay87]

I’ve tried dosing Tropic Marin’s Lanthanum (Elimi-Phos Rapid) and even dosing small amounts seemed to irritate my tangs as they would get chippy with each other and I’d see fin damage the next day. It’s also notable that lanthanum will show up in your ICP reports and I believe @Christoph has suggested that the dissolved lanthanum likely has some ill effects on the life in the aquarium.

 

[fish_collector]

Just sayin'

 

[BryanM]

Just sayin'

This is definitely the video that had me rethinking using LC.

 

[Miami Reef]

I was fortunate enough to use lanthanum to reduce the phosphate without having issues. I am using GFO to maintain it now.

 

[SeaDweller]

I dosed lanthanum last night. My yellow tang, male blonde naso, and orange shoulder tang were fine. I also never had an issue with lanthanum in the past with tangs. The tank got slightly cloudy last night after dosing.

If it kills fish for some people, there must be something negative about it. Is it possible for there to be a cumulative effect?

Randy, if you had tangs that did fine after the first lanthanum dose, would you personally use it again?

Ive dosed it in my 240 years ago when I had a lot of anthias and about 12 tangs. None of them experienced death. At first I dripped it into a 1(?) micron sock (it appeared solid, I still have a few of them) and then after that I dosed (SeaKlear) into the tank itself.

All survived. Not saying this is how it should be done, but that was my experience with it. Never used it again.

 

[JB Reefer]

Ive dosed Lanthinum straight into the skimmer neck for the last 10 years never had an issue I have a bunch of tangs and expensive fish never had a fish die. Ive dosed 150 ml for 500 gallon tank and never had any issues.

 

[Jackal799]

Just jumping on this late. So I have a 1 month old tank. Innovative marine INT 50. Cycled the tank using some live rock but I added some dry rock that I had cooked in a tub for 6 months. Anyway, checked my phosphates and my Hanna was maxing out. RO water showed zero phosphates so I’m betting on rock leech. Anyway, I have 2 clowns, a leopard wrasse, a blenny and a small tomini tang. I dosed 5ml of phosphate E into a 5 micron filter sock slowly (over 4 hours) and have seen no ill effects on the livestock. I plan on using LC until my phosphates get down to .5 then will switch to rowaphos. Just sharing my experience and I think it’s a great tool when used safely. Don’t know long it’ll take to my phosphates down but fortunately I don’t have any coral as I wanted to wait until my tank stabilizes.